Validation of a Spanish adaptation of the Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI-SP)

Test anxiety had become a highly frequent problem in our society, studies estimate that approximately 15-25% of the university students had high levels of examination-related anxiety. These dates are important not only because the high number of students affected but also because the negative effects that test anxiety had on students’ academic results. To date the most widely used inventory directed to asses test anxiety for both research and clinical purposes is the Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI, Spielberger, 1980). This questionnaire conceptualizes test anxiety as a situation-specific personality trait and assesses both emotional and cognitive components of test anxiety. The TAI had been adapted and validated for a wide range of different cultures and languages, however no studies had been conducted in Spain. Thus, the present study is directed to evaluate the psychometric properties and the factorial structure of a Spanish version of the Test Anxiety Inventory (TAI-SP). With this aim, the TAI-SP was administered to 1361 university students of the University of Barcelona, most of them women (82.7%), between the ages of 18 and 54 years. The factor structure of the TAI-SP was explored using factorial analysis. In line with theoretical predictions, the factor analysis revealed two components of test anxiety, worry and emotionality. The total scale and subscale scores demonstrated satisfactory internal consistency reliability. Also, the conception of worry and emotionality as two correlated but separable factors of test anxiety was supported. These results showed that the TAI-SP have good psychometric properties, which were comparable to those reported for the original English form.